Monster mecha with smile-controlled gatling guns makes public debut

 

Hold fire on those Christmas lists. Japanese artist Kogoro Kurata has unveiled a 13 ft (4 meter) tall, 9900 lb (4500 kg) prototype mecha robot called Kuratas, which comes complete with "weapon systems" and is apparently cable of being driven by an onboard human pilot.
Kuratas is controlled via a software system called V-Sido, which, in addition to the cockpit dash, allows control of the robot by smartphone (over a 3G network), or a master-slave system that sees Kuratas mimic the moves of a much smaller model, which can be manipulated into shapes by the user from a remote position. From the cockpit, a steering column is used to steer the robot, which also includes arms of its own which for manipulating the robot's upper limbs. Kinect controls are also an option.

Although Kuratas has legs, it has wheels rather than feet. It can be driven in both high and low configurations, with a diesel-fueled top speed of about 10 km/h (6 mph).
Of course, no mecha is complete without a fearsome arsenal of weaponry, and Kuratas does not disappoint. The water-powered LOHAS launcher appears to fire water bottles over a range of several meters. Its two gatling guns can fire 6000 BBs per minute, and Kuratas can supposedly auto-target and track humans. Most fearsomely of all, the gatling guns fire when the pilot smiles.

Kogoro Kurata points out that this is a work of art rather than a vehicle, and not designed for safety. Despite this, both promo video and website suggest that Kuratas will be available to buy in the future. Starting at a mere US$1,523,500, it appears that your Kuratas will be highly customizable, with a design-it-yourself paint job designer apparently built in to the online ordering tool.
Plasticpals reports that Kuratas made an appearance at this year's Wonder Fest, so there's at least one of these things out there somewhere. Whether the control systems work quite as well as the videos make out, and whether these will ever truly see a commercial release (however limited) remains to be seen.

A user's video reference guide is embedded below. I suggest that watching it is worth the 4 minutes and 41 seconds required.
Source: Suidobashi heavy industry, via Plasticpals

Bio-Retina to enter clinical trials in 2013

 

At least 25-30 million people worldwide have age-related macular degeneration (AMD), one of the leading causes of blindness in middle-aged and older adults. Israeli start-up Nano Retina has announced its new Bio-Retina, a tiny array of photodetectors which can be implanted directly on the retinal surface. Ready to enter clinical trials in 2013, the Bio-Retina restores vision to AMD sufferers almost immediately following the simple implantation process.

The retina is a light sensitive tissue lining the inside rear surface of our eyes. Retinal tissue is layered, where the photoreceptors of the eye (rods and cones) are located beneath several layers of neurons and ganglia interconnected by synapses. These neurons transmit the image to the optic nerve, and the ganglia perform low-level processing of the visual information.

AMD is caused by deterioration or breakdown of the retina's central region, which is called the macula. It is a small area in the retina that is responsible for a person's central vision and which allows you to see fine details. AMD progressively destroys the ability of the rods and cones to convert light into signals transmitted along the optic nerve. A retina affected by AMD still has fully functional optic nerves, as well as the retinal subsystems which feed neural signals from the rods and cones into the optic nerve. But when the rods and cones are inactive, there are no light-generated neural signals for the rest of the retina to transfer. AMD patients often retain some peripheral vision, but their central vision usually disappears completely in time, resulting in legal blindness. Total blindness is also common. There are currently no effective treatments for AMD.

Bio-Retina

Nano Retina has now developed the Bio-Retina - a tiny (3 x 4 mm) microchip implant that is inserted into the eye and glued to the retina in a minimally invasive procedure. It does not treat AMD, but rather seeks to relieve the blindness resulting from AMD. A small slit is cut in the eye under local anesthesia, and the implant is inserted and pressed against the damaged macula.

The Bio-Retina uses the optical system (lens, iris, and pointing and focusing musculature) of the eye. It consists of an integrated circuit with a grid of photodetectors, microelectrodes and microelectronic circuitry that replace the eye’s natural photoreceptors and feed visual information through the healthy retinal structures to the optic nerve and the visual centers of the brain. The patient does not have to learn to interpret jumbled images, as the photodetectors measure the incoming light in a particular location on the image, and then stimulate the optical neurons immediately below the spot where the light would have hit in any case. In most cases immediate, normal feeling sight will be returned to the patient. The image is only in grayscale at this point, but color implants are not beyond the reach of this basic technology.
Beginning next year, the first clinical studies will be carried out with a 24 x 24 pixel grid (576 photodetectors), while later rounds of the clinical studies will have a 72 x 72 pixel grid (5184 photodetectors). For comparison, the Argus II retinal implant, now approved for use in Europe, provides roughly an 8 x 8 pixel grid. The figure below gives a feeling for how much vision corresponds to different sized arrays.

Images of a subject at resolutions ranging from 4 x 4 pixels to 72 x 72 pixels.

Clearly at the smallest resolutions there is little effective sight - even at 10 x 10 pixels, one would see little more than presence or absence of a large object. At the early Bio-Retina resolution of 24 x 24 pixels, one can clearly make out there is a person wearing a hat, and even that the person is probably female, while the later Bio-Retina resolution of 72 x 72 pixels is rather like watching an old black and white TV image. Perfectly usable, if not exactly exciting - unless a moment ago you were blind!
One problem remains. To detect light and electrically stimulate the visual neurons requires a source of electrical power. Nano Retina solved this problem rather elegantly. The microchip implant was also given a very small photovoltaic cell, pointing toward the lens of the eye. The implant user wears glasses which are perfectly normal, except that they incorporate a near-infrared battery powered laser directed into the eye. The laser light is invisible and harmless to the eye, but can drive the photovoltaic cell to deliver as much as three milliwatts of electrical power - more than enough to power the implant. The movie below gives an excellent overview of the Bio-Retina and its clinical use.
Blindness following a lifetime of good vision is often a terrible blow to people hoping to complete their careers and enjoy retirement. Sight is so much a part of how we experience the world that the true consequences of its loss are beyond the capability of most of us to imagine. With luck, further development of this sort of research will prevent future generations from having to face this situation.
Source: Nano Retina

"Backward-compatible" technology for simultaneous 2D and 3D

 

Backward-compatible Stereo 3D technology allows the same video to be watched in 2D and 3D at the same time  
 
According to just about every consumer electronics manufacturer on the planet, 3D TV is on its way to becoming mainstream – perhaps ultimately even ending up as the norm. That’s not good news for people who experience headaches or motion sickness when watching 3D video, or who simply don’t want to put on a pair of glasses every time they watch TV. Help may be on the way, however ... researchers have now devised a system known as “Backward-compatible Stereo 3D.” It allows some people to put on glasses and watch 3D video in its intended three-dimensional format, while others can watch that same video at the same time, in distortion-free 2D.
The system was developed by researchers from Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Informatics, the Computer Science department at Saarland University (also in Germany) and Telecom ParisTech in France. It is based around a new understanding of the way in which our visual system reacts to stereoscopic 3D video images, and how that relates to our perception of the depth of actual real-world objects.
With ordinary 3D systems, two overlapping images of the subject are displayed at once. When viewed through 3D glasses, one of those images is seen by one eye, while the other image is seen by the other eye. This simulates the phenomenon of binocular disparity, in which the brain analyzes the images of an object received by each of our eyes, and determines how far away that object is based on the differences in viewing angle between those two images. The closer the object is to us, the greater the difference between angles, and vice-versa.
One of the things that the scientists looked into was the way in which our visual system combines binocular disparity with other depth cues, such as the qualities of objects’ shadows. This led them to be able to predict what depth objects in 3D footage will appear to be at, via manipulation of these cues.

While the exact workings of the system are confidential, it does reportedly utilize the Cornsweet illusion, in which a gradated central line within an image creates the illusion that the two halves of the background behind it are of different brightnesses, when they’re in fact the same.
What it all boils down to is that when viewed without glasses, Backward-compatible Stereo 3D footage looks pretty much like normal 2D video. In the examples provided, there is still a little fuzziness around the edges of the subjects, although that could perhaps be finessed out with further refinements of the technology.
The system has just been licensed to Canada’s TandemLaunch Technologies, which is developing it for commercial use.
Source: Max Planck Institute

Wacom Cintiq HD24 now with MULTI TOUCH!!!

Muti-touch can be used to do things like manipulate a 3D model or pan, zoom and rotate an image

Muti-touch functionality was added to Wacom's Intuos5 graphics tablets earlier this year and, after winning much praise from users, it's no surprise to see it arrive on the company's Cintiq range of interactive pen displays. The Cintiq range was first introduced in 2005 and the addition of the Cintiq 24HD touch now allows users to use their fingers to pan, zoom and rotate the canvas at the same time as using the pressure and tilt sensitive pen.

Aimed at digital creative professionals, from freelance industrial designers to Hollywood animators, the Wacom Cintiq 24HD touch features a 24-inch, 1,920 x 1,200 pixel widescreen HD display capable of displaying 1.07 billion colors and 97 percent of Adobe's color gamut. The display can also be color-calibrated.

While creatives are obviously still able to using Wacom’s pressure and tilt sensitive cordless battery-free Grip Pen on the screen and experience a feeling similar to using traditional brushes and pens (with 2,048 pressure levels on pen tip and eraser), they are no longer limited to using buttons and the keyboard to access other functions.

Wacom claims that muti-touch, which can be used to manipulate a 3D model or to pan, zoom and rotate an image, helps create an immersive experience and natural way of working. "The Cintiq 24HD touch closely replicates the experience of working with two hands when using traditional materials such as paints, markers and clay while giving the artist powerful capabilities that only exist in today’s creative software applications," said a Wacom spokesperson.

Also minimizing keyboard dependency are two Touch Rings which are positioned on either side of the display and can be used to access frequently used shortcut commands and perform functions such as zooming, scrolling and changing brush size. There are also 10 customizable ExpressKeys (five on each side of the tablet), which can be set for application-specific shortcuts.

The counter-weighted stand of the Wacom Cintiq 24HD means it can be adjusted to bring the display surface over the edge of the desk, so that it floats just above your knees, or more vertically like an easel.

The Cintiq 24HD touch – which measures 30.3 x 18.3 x 2.5 inches (769.3 x 463.74 x 64 mm) and weighs 28.6 kg (63 lb) with the stand, 13.7 kg (30.2 lb) without – is expected to ship in August 2012 with a price of US$3,699.

Source: Wacom

MIT develops new glasses-free 3D TV technology

MIT’s Media Lab has proposed a new technique for multiple-perspective and glasses-free 3D technology

Though 3D movies have been around for a while, the experience of visiting a cinema to catch the latest blockbuster is dampened by unwieldy glasses and the limitation of only one fixed perspective being offered to all. The illusion of depth is present, but this is far removed from the hologram-like, multiple-perspective experience which would truly wow movie-goers. MIT's Media Lab’s Camera Culture group proposes a new approach to 3D images that promises glasses-free multiple-perspective 3D. Perhaps best of all though, MIT's technique uses inexpensive existing LCD technology, clearing the way for the tech to be implemented into TV's.

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Holography works, but...

“Holography works, it’s beautiful, nothing can touch its quality,” enthused Douglas Lanman, a postdoc at the Media Lab. “The problem, of course, is that holograms don’t move. To make them move, you need to create a hologram in real time, and to do that, you need … little tiny pixels, smaller than anything we can build at large volume at low cost. So the question is, what do we have now? We have LCDs. They’re incredibly mature, and they’re cheap."

In order to understand the MIT-based team’s proposal, it’s useful to consider the Nintendo 3DS. The 3DS sports a glasses-free 3D display which provides an illusion of depth made possible by a relatively simple process: in the top screen, two layered LCD screens display two slightly offset images which represent each perspective of the user's eyes. Meanwhile, the bottom screen merely shows alternating dark and light bands in order to ensure each eye sees only the image intended for it. A limitation to Nintendo's console is that users must keep their gaze in a fixed position to experience the 3D effect.

Researchers at the Media Lab Camera Culture group reasoned that they could take the principles utilized by Nintendo still further. By tailoring the patterns displayed on the top and bottom screens to each other, the team was able to filter the light emitted by the display in a more sophisticated way and thus create an image that would alter with varying perspectives. Dubbed HR3D, the project appears to be independent to the other MIT-based holographic television project we previously reported on.

Reducing the hertz

The researchers first calculated that for the HR3D to offer convincing multiple-perspective 3D, the screen used would be required to flicker ten times for every frame of 3D video, pushing said screen up to an impractical 1,000 Hz refresh rate. But by combining two LCD screens in unison, the Media Lab team was eventually able to get the required refresh rate for convincing multiple-perspective 3D down to a more realistic, but as yet still unattainable, 360 Hz.

This solution brought its own problems though, as using two LCD screens in unison increases the complexity of calculating the required patterns, so the team then turned to computed topography (CT) technology that is used in medical imaging. It turns out that the computation involved in CT technology is very similar to the math that the MIT Media Lab Camera Culture group is dealing with.

“The way I like to think about it is, we’re building a patient whose CT scan is the view,” said Lanman.

Once the numbers were crunched with the help of CT technology, a display was produced that approaches the experience of a true moving hologram. Until an LCD display is able to offer refresh rates of 360 Hz, the existing limit of 240 Hz is ample for proving the possibilities of the project. Since LCD's have doubled from 120 Hz to 240 Hz in recent years, it's entirely possible that 360 Hz will be available soon.

Still in development

At this year's Siggraph computer-graphics conference, the Media Lab researchers will demonstrate two prototype displays: one which uses three LCD panels and another which employs just two panels. To widen the viewing angle of the display, the latter places a sheet of lenses developed for stereoscopic display systems that refract light left and right in between the pair of LCD panels. With the three-panel prototype, the 3D illusion offered is consistent within a viewing angle of 20 degrees, but the refractive-lens prototype can offer viewing angle of 50 degrees.

HR3D is still very much in the development stage at this point and there's significant work to be done before we see multiple-perspective 3D TV in our homes, not to mention the fact that the relevant LCD technology still needs to be created. That said, should the HR3D prove as cost-effective and technologically feasible as these experiments suggest, awe-inspiring home TV setups could indeed become commonplace in the near-future.

Source : MIT

Asus Transformer AiO boots windows 8 and Android 4.0, doubles as MASSIVE tablet!!!

The Transformer All in One brings together Windows 8, and Android 4.0

ASUS has unveiled a prototype of its latest all-in-one PC at Computex 2012. The Transformer AiO is the first desktop targeted device designed to run both Android 4.0 and the upcoming Windows 8 OS, and while an all-in-one case design isn't new, the difference here is that the 18.4-inch multi-touch display can be completely detached to function as a (very large) tablet.

The AiO lives up to its Transformer name thanks to its desktop and tablet configurations, but unlike previous ASUS Transformer devices, it can hardly be called portable.

When you remove the 10-point multi-touch LED-backlit display from its base, the AiO instantly switches from Windows 8 to Android 4.0, giving access to applications that better fit the tablet configuration. In tablet mode all processing is handled at the desktop dock, which requires a constant power supply.

As ASUS has only shown off an early AiO prototype that's said to use an Intel Ivy Bridge processor, but there's currently no further details on specs (battery life will be an interesting figure given the size of the tablet), pricing or a release date.

Source: ASUS via: The Verge

Parrot’s Zik wireless headphones with touch panel and NFC technology

Parrot's Zik wireless headphones feature a touch panel on the right earpiece

Parrot certainly has tried to pack as much technology as possible into its first pair of wireless headphones. Alongside the standard Bluetooth connectivity, the company’s new Zik headphones feature active noise cancellation technology, a touch panel on the right earpiece, a head detection sensor, bone conduction sensor, five microphones and, in a headphone first, integrated near field communication (NFC) technology.

Like Parrot’s Zikmu wireless speaker system, the Zik headphones were designed by French designer Philippe Starck. The entire surface of the right ear cup is a capacitive touch panel that allows the wearer to swipe a finger horizontally to skip forward and back between tracks, swipe up or down to adjust the volume, tap to answer a phone call, or touch the panel for two seconds to reject a call. Additionally, sliding the headphones down around your neck will pause music playback and put the headphones in standby mode, donning them again will start them up again.

When listening to music or talking on the phone, two microphones located on the exterior of the headphones and two inside each headset analyze the ambient noise so the headphones can produce opposite acoustic waves to block it out. Parrot says this active noise canceling (ACN) technology allows the headphones to eliminate up to 25 db of ambient noise.

The headphones are also designed to make it easier for the person on the other end of the line to hear the wearer better, with a bone conduction sensor located in the cushion of the left earpiece detecting the wearer’s jaw movements and matching these movements to the speech so it can be separated from the surrounding noise.

The Zik headphones are also the first on the market with NFC technology, with a tag in the left headset allowing Bluetooth pairing with NFC compatible devices by touching them to the left ear cup.

The Zik’s 40 mm Neodynium drivers are rated at 32 ohms and pump out a frequency range of 10 Hz to 20 kHz with a sound pressure level of 110 dB per volt at 1 kHz. Parrot including a DSP algorithm dubbed “Parrot Concert Hall” that promises to recreate a concert hall listening experience and place the music in front of you. This effect can also be customized via the free “Parrot Audi Suite” app available for iOS and Android, which is also used to turn the CAN on and off, modify the equalizer and check the battery level.

The downside of all this technological wizardry is the hit it inflicts on battery life. The Zik’s 800 mAh lithium ion battery, which is recharged via microUSB, will provide power for around six hours with all features activated, around 18 hours with only ANC activated, and up to 24 hours in standby mode. However, the battery is swappable, with Parrot selling spares for US$30. The headphones can also be used when the battery is flat via an included 3.5 mm jack cable.

The Zik headphones measure 150 mm (5.9 in) wide by 198 mm (7.8 in) deep by 80 mm (3.1 in) deep and weighs 325 g (11.5 oz). They will be available from late July/August for US$399 in the U.S., GBP349 in the U.K. and AUD$499 in Australia.

Source: Parrot

Ouya breaks cover, $99 Android-powered games console in development

The Ouya games console comes with a controller designed by Yves Behar

Ouya (pronounced Ooo-yah) is a new Android-powered games console currently under development. New games consoles from companies other than the established big three of Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo are rare, and with good reason. Gaming hardware is notoriously difficult to get right and is usually a loss-maker with the software sold being where the real money is. However, Ouya isn't your typical home games console, and it isn't designed to go head-to-head with the PS3, Xbox 360, or Wii in any real sense. Instead it's an Android-powered device that will sell for just US$99.

Ouya is a console designed to play the types of disposable games currently popular on mobile devices and downloadable via PSN and Xbox Live. Think independent, low-budget creations that offer something other than gob-smacking visuals.

The new console is the brainchild of games industry veteran Julie Uhrman and award-winning designer Yves Behar, who between them feel they can shake up the status quo that currently exists within the industry. Uhrman is the creative driving force of Boxer8, the company behind Ouya, while Behar (best-known for the OLPC XO laptop and Jambox) designed both the console and the controller.

The thinking behind Ouya is that while mobile gaming is massively on the rise, with developers producing some momentous titles with global appeal, the TV is still the best screen to be playing games on. Ouya provides the hardware platform that attempts to marry the two together, with a console designed to be hooked up to a television and the Internet in order to offer a wealth of independent games.

The lineup of games will initially comprise mostly ports of Android games designed for phones and tablets, but over time this is expected to change. Several independent games developers are already committed to the project, while others (including the developer of Minecraft) have expressed an interest in getting involved at a later date.

All of the games made available on Ouya will be free-to-play, meaning either a section of the game will be available to sample or the full game will be free, with developers cashing in with paid-for upgrades, level packs etc. This is the only prerequisite required for developers wanting to bring their titles to the new console. Beyond that anybody is free to create content for Ouya, with every console being described as its own dev kit. Boxer8 is committed to fostering an open community, with rooting and hacking positively encouraged. Other types of app will also be available to download to Ouya. The first of these to be announced is Twitch.tv, which live-streams competitive gaming.

The hardware specs of Ouya in its current form are as follows:

• Quad-core Tegra 3 processor
• 1 GB of RAM
• 8 GB of flash storage
• HDMI and USB 2.0 ports
• Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
• Android 4.0
• A Controller with two analog sticks, a d-pad, eight buttons, and a touchpad

After sailing past the original funding target of $950,000, backers are being asked to suggest new goals for the project, including improvements to the hardware. From here on in it will likely be a case of weighing up costs versus performance, as Boxer8 is committed to the $99 retail price of the machine. To deliver on that the company will clearly not be able to add every improvement and feature suggested by backers. The console itself can be offered at such a low price because Boxer8 will take 30 percent of all revenue generated by the games sold through the platform.

Ouya is expected to start shipping March 2013. At the time of writing funding has hit $2.4 million, with over 19,000 backers pledging money to the cause, so going the Kickstarter route seems to have been a good decision. In order to get developers on board Boxer8 needs to build a strong userbase for them to sell their wares to. Sticking with private investments would likely not have generated the groundswell of support for the Ouya console or the amount of press coverage that landing on Kickstarter has done.

Ouya looks to be a solid piece of hardware with backing from industry veterans, indie developers, and gamers alike. However, there is one word of caution that should be noted. This is a gap in the market that's closing fast. Not only are smart televisions and set-top boxes such as Apple TV and Google TV likely to add apps and games in future iterations, Internet-connected devices with access to cloud gaming services such as OnLive could completely eviscerate Ouya.

There is talk in the games industry that dedicated hardware is on its way out, with the forthcoming Wii U, PlayStation 4, and Xbox 720 possibly the last pure games consoles ever to grace our living rooms. Sony has already acquired Gaikai for $380 million but isn't yet being forthcoming about how it will use the infrastructure going forward. In a future where the hardware located in people's houses or hands is immaterial to the quality and quantity of games available to play, Ouya may struggle to compete. But that is a future that has yet to materialize.

Source: Kickstarter